Increasing Awareness in Distributed Software Development Workspaces Copyright, 1997 © Dale Carnegie & Associates, Inc. X International Workshop on Groupware (CRIWG'04) Marco A. S. Mangan 1,2, Marcos R. S. Borges 3,Cláudia Werner 1 1 Computer Science Department, COPPE, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro – Brazil 2 Faculdade de Informática, PUCRS – Brazil 3 Núcleo de Computação Eletrônica and Instituto de Matemática, UFRJ, Brazil {mangan,

Alceste : CRIWG’04: Sep 06, :: 21 Scenario  Distributed or Global Software Development Teammates in different places or worktime Virtual teams In theory: increased productivity In practice: cultural problems, awareness and communication breakdown  Distributed Sofware Development Environments (DSDEs) Software development tools + collaboration tools Examples: Palantir, Milos, Tukan, Gossip, Serendipity

Alceste : CRIWG’04: Sep 06, :: 21 Motivation  Inadequate support for collaboration in current software development environments (e.g. Eclipse SDE)  Collaboration aspects: communication, coordination, memory, and awareness  Economics of software development: software reuse DSDE commonalities and variabilities  Alternative aproach to development with groupware frameworks and toolkits Development model: Multiple-players, framelets Run-time: No application thread control

Alceste : CRIWG’04: Sep 06, :: 21 Problem and solution  Problem: How to build a DSDE? How to provide adequate group and task support? How to manage environment evolution?  Proposal: Enhancement of pre-existent software tools A middleware-based collaboration server implementing DSDE commonalities Extension mechanisms to deal with DSDE variabilities Guidelines to develop and maintain extensions

Alceste : CRIWG’04: Sep 06, :: 21 Outline  Middleware overview  A process to develop awareness enhanced DSDEs  Examples of extensions  Conclusions and future work

Alceste : CRIWG’04: Sep 06, :: 21 Middleware architecture  A description of the main components of a DSDE CASE tool: an event source Collector: a program to collect events (Collaborative) Extension: an event sinker  Blackboard architecture Communication uses a single shared space On-line notification Template-based queries A JINI service

Alceste : CRIWG’04: Sep 06, :: 21 Middleware architecture  Events: operations + awareness model elements Examples: create class, update line, window move  At least, three awareness models Spatial: windows, viewports, UI components Semantic: class, packages, relationships Document-based: document, paragraphs, lines  Model selection depends on end-user task

Alceste : CRIWG’04: Sep 06, :: 21 Middleware architecture  At least, five basic operations Create, retrieve, update, delete, view/touch  Events are partially ordered into channels Historic data and on-line data  No separation of commited and local data  An API implements events, operations, and channel usage Less than 20 interfaces, average 6 methods each

Alceste : CRIWG’04: Sep 06, :: 21 Middleware architecture CASE tool Collector Extension Collector CASE tool Extension Event Notification e1 write(e1)

Alceste : CRIWG’04: Sep 06, :: 21 Middleware architecture CASE tool Collector Extension Collector CASE tool Extension Event Notification e1 query(e?) notify(e?)

Alceste : CRIWG’04: Sep 06, :: 21 Middleware architecture CASE tool Collector Extension Collector CASE tool Extension Event Notification e2[e1] write(e2[e1]) e1

Alceste : CRIWG’04: Sep 06, :: 21 Outline  Middleware overview  A process to develop awareness enhanced DSDEs  Examples of extensions  Conclusions and future work

Alceste : CRIWG’04: Sep 06, :: 21 Process  A set of guidelines to DSDE development using this approach  Roles: description of required skills and responsabilities CASE tool developer Enhancement developer Integration developer Environment composer  Activities: sequence of logical steps to compose a new DSDE People, Tool, and Context Assesment Extension and Collector Selection

Alceste : CRIWG’04: Sep 06, :: 21 Outline  Middleware overview  A process to develop awareness enhanced DSDEs  Examples of extensions  Conclusions and future work

Alceste : CRIWG’04: Sep 06, :: 21 Examples Task: software peer review CASE tool: Odyssey SDE Collector: Java UI System Spatial awareness model Task: concurrent programming CASE tool: Eclipse SDE Collector: tool extension mechanism Document-based awareness model

Alceste : CRIWG’04: Sep 06, :: 21 Examples Task: concurrent modeling CASE tool: Odyssey SDE Collector: tool extension mechanism Semantic awareness model Task: software management CASE tool: Odyssey SDE Collector: persistence layer Semantic awareness model

Alceste : CRIWG’04: Sep 06, :: 21 Outline  Middleware overview  A process to develop awareness enhanced DSDEs  Examples of extensions  Conclusions and future work

Alceste : CRIWG’04: Sep 06, :: 21 Conclusions  Alternative to the development of DSDEs  The extension of pre-existent software tools reduce he problem of task support  Enhancements are composed of two reusable parts: collectors and extensions  A middleware implements common collaborative funcionalities  A process guides the development of DSDEs  Enhancement examples demonstrate the feasibility of this approach

Alceste : CRIWG’04: Sep 06, :: 21 Conclusions  Limitations Side-show windows Dependency on the extension possibilities of CASE tool and its run- time environment Conservative changes

Alceste : CRIWG’04: Sep 06, :: 21 Future Work  Third-party feasibility evaluation Observe planning and development of extensions with the architecture  Work impact evaluation Observe a group performing a development task with and without the extensions

Increasing Awareness in Distributed Software Development Workspaces Copyright, 1997 © Dale Carnegie & Associates, Inc. X International Workshop on Groupware (CRIWG'04) Marco A. S. Mangan 1,2, Marcos R. S. Borges 3,Cláudia Werner 1 1 Computer Science Department, COPPE, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro – Brazil 2 Faculdade de Informática, PUCRS – Brazil 3 Núcleo de Computação Eletrônica and Instituto de Matemática, UFRJ, Brazil {mangan,